ARTICLES ABOUT BRETT BRACKETT BY DATE - PAGE 2

There's no more pretending. A Penn State player no longer will quote the company line about how no one is looking ahead to Alabama because he needs to worry about the season opener against Youngstown State. This is what everyone was waiting for. This is Alabama week, capped by Saturday night's nationally televised game against college football's top-ranked team. "Now we don't have to talk about that we have something else before that," said wide receiver Brett Brackett, one of the heroes of the Nittany Lions' 44-14 win on Saturday.

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - Brett Brackett came to Penn State as a quarterback but has spent his career getting lost in the shuffle at wide receiver, catching only three passes all of last season. But Saturday, the 6-foot-6, 242-pound fifth-year senior seemed to be everywhere grabbing passes - eight in all - from true freshman quarterback Rob Bolden , and matched his career total of touchdowns with two. If he was excited about his performance after the Nittany Lions' 44-14 victory over Youngstown State, he didn't show it. "I just try to go out there and do whatever I can to help the team win the game," said Brackett, a cocaptain.

STATE COLLEGE Pa. - His teammates say Penn State freshman Rob Bolden is a cool customer. Maybe he's a little too cool. "In the huddle, we all had to tell him to speak up," offensive tackle Quinn Barham said Saturday after Bolden's collegiate debut. "We couldn't hear him. I'm on the end of the huddle and I told him, 'You've got to speak up, man.' But he got pretty good at it. " Making his formal introduction Saturday to Nittany Nation, including the 101,213 members at Beaver Stadium, Bolden spoke with his poise and his arm. The rookie completed 20 of 29 passes for 239 yards and two touchdowns to lead the 19th-ranked Nittany Lions to a 44-14 victory over Youngstown State.

After a rough summer that saw him miss a number of personal appearances because of an intestinal disorder, coach Joe Paterno left no doubt regarding his intended whereabouts during Penn State's 2010 football season. "I'm on the field," Paterno said Tuesday at his weekly teleconference. "I haven't missed one play in practice. And I don't intend to miss any games, any plays. " The 83-year-old Paterno, beginning his 45th season as head Lion, had to cancel three alumni outings around the state, including one in Philadelphia, because of his illness.

The questions about the Penn State quarterback situation were raining in over the phone, and Joe Paterno tried to curb the enthusiasm at one point by saying, "I'm getting tired of talking about it. " The Penn State coach said Tuesday he had yet to make a decision on the identity of the starting quarterback for Saturday's season-opening game at Beaver Stadium versus Youngstown State. As for when he might make the call, "We, hopefully, will maybe do it [Wednesday] night," Paterno said at the first of his weekly teleconferences.

Between the start of preseason practice and the season opener, the most significant event in Penn State football was expected to be the release of the season's first depth chart - revealing the identity of the Nittany Lions' new starting quarterback. Alas, Joe Paterno decided not to tip his hand when the depth chart was released on Sunday, indicating that three players remained in the running to take the season's first snap from center Saturday against Youngstown State at Beaver Stadium.

Curtis Drake, a former West Catholic quarterback who impressed Penn State coaches at wide receiver as a freshman, has seen his status for his second season put at risk because of a fracture of his left tibia. Drake suffered the broken leg during Monday's practice, according to a source, and will be sidelined indefinitely. When reached by telephone late Wednesday, Drake said he had undergone surgery earlier in the day and did not wish to talk. A Penn State spokesman said no official information was available on Drake's injury.

Penn State sophomore wide receiver Curtis Drake, who quarterbacked West Catholic High to the PIAA Class AA state championship game in 2008, will miss at least the first two games of the season and possibly more after fracturing his left tibia during a Monday practice, a source said. The 5-11, 174-pound Drake, who had eight receptions for 98 yards as a true freshman, was injured on a play that did not involve contact. "Nothing happened [that should have caused the injury]," Drake said when contacted by the Daily News.

After staying up late at Penn State's headquarters at the Peabody Hotel chatting with alumni, backers, and members of his players' families, Joe Paterno walked into yesterday's season-ending meeting with reporters coming off four hours of sleep. But he wasn't complaining. The 83-year-old Paterno concluded his 44th season as the Nittany Lions' head coach with a 19-17 victory over Louisiana State in Friday's Capital One Bowl, giving him his 11th win of the season and the 394th of his career.